For sixty years the Center for Latin American and Iberian Studies at Vanderbilt University has distinguished itself in teaching, research, and outreach in Latin American Studies. Founded in 1947 as the Institute for Brazilian Studies, the Center has since expanded its focus to include Mesoamerica, Spanish South America, and the Caribbean. In 2006 CLAIS was designated a National Resource Center by the U.S. Department of Education; our undergraduate program is ranked eighth in the nation by the Gourman Report.

While maintaining one of the strongest concentrations of Brazilianists of any university in the United States, the Center’s renowned faculty also has particular strengths in Mesoamerican anthropology and archaeology, the study of democracy building and economic development, Latin American literature and languages, and African populations in Latin America and the Caribbean.

CLAIS offers undergraduate major and minors, a M.A. degree, and a joint MBA/MA in Latin American Studies. Moreover, the Center offers a popular graduate certificate program and administers summer research awards to students across the university carrying out work in Latin America. We are also one of the select graduate programs approved by the Department of Defense for its Foreign Area Officer training.

The Center offers several academic year and summer federally funded Foreign Language Area Studies (FLAS) fellowships for the study Portuguese and Mayan languages. Through a FIPSE/CAPES program, CLAIS has regular student exchanges with the Universidade de São Paulo and the Universidade Federal da Bahia; we also have formal exchanges with the Universdad de las Americas in Puebla, Mexico and other universities throughout the region.

CLAIS works closely with the Center for the Americas, and through the CFA Vanderbilt is home to the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) and to the secretariat of the Brazilian Studies Association (BRASA). In addition, CLAIS is home to the Ecclesiastical Sources in Slave Societies research project (ESSS) and the Vanderbilt Institute for Coffee Studies.

The Center fosters a lively research community on campus by sponsoring colloquia, conferences, films, and a speaker series that brings distinguished scholars, government and business leaders to campus. We also sponsor an active outreach program to area schools and the business, legal, and medical communities.

Graduates of our graduate program are currently employed in government, business, NGOs, and academic institutions in the United States and in many Latin American countries.